Impromptu
by deBrumbled
Summary: Chp 1: Kakashi fears that reading too much of his favored little orange book has started to affect his perception of things. Chp 2: All Sakura ever wanted was a little recognition for her art.
1. I Know

**Errr, probably a series of short KakaSaku stories/drabbles. Hope they are somewhat enjoyable.**

Kakashi sighed and raised his orange book a little higher to obscure the sight of his former student.

It wasn't that he disliked Sakura, it was just that lately every time he happened to glance up at her, she seemed to be… well… in some sort of provocative pose. He winced at the thought. Of course, Sakura wasn't actually purposefully posing… He liked to think… It just so happened that he'd recently had a bad string of luck and always caught her at unfortunate moments.

He scrupulously studied the pages in front of him, very carefully ignoring the bobbing of the kunoichi's round rear as she ran her hands down her long legs towards her toes. Kakashi wasn't sure he looked that sensual when he warmed up for training. But then again he was almost a middle aged man now. Anyway, the whole illusion must be his overactive imagination at work. He cursed said imagination for making the innocent scene seem a little more… enticing.

He shook his head to clear the worrying thoughts. He was here as a professional, a teacher no less. It wouldn't do to be entertaining any unsavoury notions! Turning a page, he diligently ignored the breathy moan of satisfaction as she stretched upward – delicate hands and slender arms becoming visible to him over the top of the book.

"Mhmmm, Sensei, do you want to help me warm up?" Sakura called to him from behind his protective literary barrier.

"I think you're probably doing a good enough job yourself, Sakura." He replied evenly, attempting a nonchalant glance and almost immediately regretting it.

"But Sensei," she pouted, big green eyes regarding him… hungrily? His stomach flipped nervously as she smiled coyly, rolling her shoulders. The fabric of her shirt rode up slowly to reveal a sliver of soft, smooth skin "I'm ever so stiff today."

Kakashi swallowed, trying not to look at the tempting bit of flesh.

"You look flexible enough to me."

"Oh, do I?" She practically purred, a small suggestive smile tugging at her lips.

Unsure how to answer, Kakashi sort shelter behind his precious book once again. Oh god, what was happening to him? Had the years of reading Icha Icha finally gone to his head? Why did everything his beloved innocent student say to him sound like some kind of innuendo? Silently, Kakashi berated himself – dammit, once he got out of here he was never going to read his smut again!

He flinched at the sound of footsteps and practically jumped out of his skin as a finger and a thumb firmly plucked the book out of his grasp. He didn't dare look up, instead staring straight ahead at a pair of creamy white thighs. If he raised his eyes, he'd definitely be able to see up that incredibly short skirt that was inevitably at the top of those thighs.

"Hm… Sakura," He began tentatively "You're standing awfully close."

"I know." She drawled.

A little afraid of the physical violence that might accompany his next comment, he tried to inch backward a touch.

"Well you see Sakura… er… I… from this angle… Well, um, Sakura…" He paused, fixing his eyes firmly on the ground "I would probably be able to see up your skirt if you stand so close."

He cowered, afraid of her fists but no beating came. Cautiously, he began to scoot even further away - her temper probably hadn't set in yet. Instead of the expected outburst, Sakura said something that terrified him more than her rage ever could have.

"Oh, I know."

Kakashi almost whimpered as he heard the sound of a zipper being pulled downward and saw the red fabric of her shirt pool at her feet. Fingers knotted through his messy silver hair and jerked his head upward.

"So do you want to help me stretch, Sensei?"

God. It really was enough to make a grown man cry.

 **Thanks for reading. Hopefully more to come. It's quite refreshing to not delve too deeply into writing I must say!**


	2. Paint It Red

Haruno Sakura was certainly top of the class when it came to art theory and history of art but unfortunately, she was distinctly under-average on the practical front. This had not been a promising start to her career as an artist. Glowering at the painting before her she carefully applied another vibrant wash of blue – which was to be her base pigment on this particular project.

She groaned as the paint seemingly refused to spread evenly.

It was all so frustrating!

She just wanted to produce one praise-worthy piece of art.

Sakura felt she could never do anything right! She diligently practised every day, read as much about technique as she could and always put the most time into her work and yet, she hadn't got so much as a "Well Done" from her teacher – one Mr Hatake Kakashi.

Her green eyes left the canvas to locate the said bastard. He was settled in a dark wooden chair in the corner of the room snoring gently. If one didn't already know, you wouldn't be able to guess he was a top rated artist and painter – he looked more like a sedated scarecrow. Dusty sunlight fell through the window making his grey hair look like golden straw and his smooth face a little younger. He snoozed contentedly, oblivious to the withering glare that his only female student sent him.

The room was peaceful around her, Naruto happily hummed away as he painted, splashing paint haphazardly over his canvas with wild sweeping strokes. Sasuke was silent as ever, his nimble, confident fingers meticulously working away as he completed his inevitably perfect picture. Sakura examined her own picture – which was currently a carefully constructed sea of blue with the faint outline of her sketch beneath. Undoubtedly, the arrogant dickheads would produce something wonderful and her own work would once again be overlooked.

Sucking air between her teeth to calm herself, she set aside her angry thoughts and attempted to move onto the next carefully planned step of her painting. She opened her sketch book and located the darker tones she'd preselected. Sakura began to mix the thick oily paint, growing frustrated as the colours took on a more reddy hue than intended. By the time she'd finally gotten the right shade and begun to neatly brush onto her painting, the bell for lunch had rung.

Naruto immediately bounded to his feet and was out the door with a gleeful shout before she could even look up from her work. Sasuke also rose and slunk wordlessly out of the room, leaving her with her still dozing teacher. She muttered darkly to herself, still woefully behind schedule, and raised a steady hand to resume painting.

"Haruno?" Called a deep voice, making her jump out her skin.

She glanced up at her teacher and back to her canvas, shrieking with anger as she saw the new long brownish line across the middle of her painting.

"What?! What do you want?!" Sakura rounded on her teacher, face red with fury.

"Oh it is you." He murmured, sitting forward in his chair with an amused expression.

"What do you mean it is me?! You only have one girl in your class!"

"Best to check."

"Best to check?!" She spat, unbelievably outraged that he apparently couldn't recognise her "I have pink hair! I am one of your three only students!"

"Oh right," He didn't seem particularly bothered by the seething girl "Where are the boys?"

"Gone to lunch."

"Why haven't you gone?" He stretched and yawned.

"I'm behind schedule." She told him with a little more blatant hostility than she'd meant to show.

"Doesn't matter. Just slap something down after lunch."

This guy was incredible! Just fucking incredible!

"Slap something down?" She echoed dangerously "I've worked so hard on this project. I can't just slap something down."

Casually he rose and crossed the room in three long strides to inspect her canvas. He tilted his head and looked at her with a little concern.

"It's blue."

She gave him a withering glare.

"It's my base colour."

"It's _all_ blue." He intoned, glancing at her sketch book to try and figure out what she'd been painting "Haven't you been painting this for a week now?"

"Yes." She ground her teeth.

"And it's _all_ blue?"

Sakura stared at him, wishing he would burst into flame. The only thing he'd ever said about her art… the only thing… AND HE HAD TO SAY THAT?! THREE TIMES?! She took a deep breath and willed herself to be polite.

"Yes, Sir, it'll not just be blue when I'm done. It's going to be a self-portrait if you're wondering."

"Well Sakura," He started, head still cocked to the side staring at her work as in deep thought.

 _'Oh so he does know who I am_?' She raged to herself as she watched him straighten and put his hands on his hips.

"I know you're probably trying out new things, to make something a little different from the boys. But this might be a little too abstract. You're not blue at all."

This was the last straw. She knew he didn't rate her art but he could at least bother to humour her until she was done. She stood up angrily, chair clattering to the floor. Before she knew what she was doing she'd dipped her paintbrush in her rouge pigment and hurled it at her teacher. The paint hit him with a soft splat and trickled down his cheek.

Silence reigned between them.

Sakura's mouth gaped open, flapping uselessly as she tried to apologise.

 _'Oh god no…._ '

Her temper has always been bad but she'd just thrown paint at the world renowned Hatake Kakashi. Her life was over! She'd never made it as an artist now. He'd ruin her for sure.

Slowly he reached up to his face and touched the paint, glancing at his fingers analytically and then at her. She flinched as he studied her. Then his large calloused fingers smeared the paint across her wide forehead with a smug smile.

"See Miss Haruno, you're not blue."

He took a step toward her and Sakura suddenly felt very dwarfed by his tall, lean figure.

"Next time you do a self-portrait," He leant forward to whisper, lips brushing against her ear "You should do it in red."

Dark eyes studied her face in satisfaction as her cheeks burned with embarrassment. He patted her head consolingly before returning to his chair, picking up a book and flipping it open nonchalantly.

When the two boys returned from lunch they chose not to inquire about the rabid looking Sakura – who was furiously scrubbing carmine paint over her blue canvas - and the sleeping Kakashi, both of whom were smeared in crimson.

 **Errr whoops. My formatting was messed up apparently. Thanks to format gangsta and Amazing Death for letting me know :)**


	3. Fairytales

Happily ever-afters were not something shinobi often managed to achieve. Sure, there were victories and sometimes the hero even got the girl. But, the happier times were always preceded by some sort of strife and usually loss of the sacrificial kind.

Not everyone got to be the lucky hero either.

Some people were just the side characters, drawn in to support the hero until his greatest moment.

Their hero was currently stood with his beautiful, serene wife, laughing loudly and scratching the back of his blonde head. He'd defeated the Big-Bad and saved the world and now he was Hokage and the pride of the village. Most of their days now were spent languidly and lazily, the horrors of the past almost a forgotten thought.

It had been a remarkably sunny week and Naruto had insisted they all take a little down time and enjoy themselves like the big extended family they pretty much were.

Kakashi glanced down from the branch he lazily lounged on, at the children playing happily at the foot of the tree. A loud and obnoxious blonde teased his shyer sister. He chuckled, the boy was so much like Naruto that it was uncanny. A dark haired girl brooded from a distance glowering intensely at the raucous boy – a child who also seemed to take very much after her father. Her chubby friend whispered something in her ear and the girl's face broke out into a gentle sad smile; perhaps, Kakashi mused, she had a little of her mother in her after all.

His eyes travelled toward the said woman who was wearing the same expression as her daughter. Behind his mask, Kakashi's own lips twitched upward – though the smile wasn't particularly happy either. The woman before him – and she'd become quite the woman now – gazed unseeingly at the scene in front of her. Her green eyes were glassy and dull like unpolished jade. Absentmindedly she tucked a strand of pink hair behind her ear, thoughts obviously far away.

Someone asked her a question and she jumped a little but grinned a little too brightly and answered quickly, trying to look engaged in the conversation. Kakashi watched her sadly. The others hadn't seemed to have noticed how absent she'd been since returning to Konoha with her infant daughter and subsequent disappearance of her husband. But Kakashi had. He recognised the façade she'd created for herself – he'd constructed similar guises over the years. Perhaps, he was still donning it at this moment.

He could tell, Sakura was lonely. He was lonely too. Possibly this was why he'd become increasingly drawn to her for the last few years.

He watched as she laughed, noting the overemphasized shake of her shoulders as she giggled at something Naruto had said. Her nose crinkled in mirth – a mannerism that had never actually been her own but something she'd copied from Ino. It was heart-breaking to watch her try to act full of happiness and to see the others so easily duped by it. But Kakashi wasn't fooled, he remembered her real laugh – a loud one, which started in her belly and came out of her wide mouth in large raggedy gasps. It wasn't girly like the one she'd been presenting them of late; it was squawky, jarring and grating, and all the more beautiful for it.

Her eyes travelled in his direction and she flinched as she caught him watching her. Sakura knew he'd figured her out. She'd known it for a long time now. Perhaps that was why she turned up unannounced at his door – bottle of sake in hand – every time Sarada stayed at a friend's.

They never said much during her infrequent visits. They just sat, watched T.V. and drank. In a way, it was the best company he could have asked for – silent but secure. They didn't ask each other unnecessary questions – there was no need for such pretence – they just wanted company.

Kakashi had grown fond of the pensive Sakura, though he missed the loud and confident woman she used to be. Still she'd become a great drinking partner. He liked the mannish way Sakura swigged deeply from the sake bottle, roughly wiping her mouth before passing it to him, fingers lingering under his for a moment as he grasped its neck. The small gesture always made his stomach flip-flop and he enjoyed watching the light blush that would slowly creep up her slender neck.

Sometimes Sakura would lean her head against him and, when she'd had a little too much to drink, she'd fall asleep. This was the only time Kakashi would see her truly content, away in her dreamland fantasies. They'd doze together through the night, with the T.V. still blaring. But, much to his disappointment, she'd always be gone by morning.

When they weren't alone they were as formal and as distant as they'd ever been. They'd exchange pleasantries, catch up on trivial gossip and sometimes go for lunch with the remnants of the old team. Yet, somehow, it all felt a bit contrived compared to those rare peaceful evenings.

Occasionally they'd share a private glance and Kakashi would have to watch her throw up her mask of false contentedness, a sweet smile to hide her sad, empty eyes. Instead of shaking her by the shoulder like he longed to do, he'd only stare back with his own uncovered, tired eye.

Recently, Kakashi had begun to wonder if he loved her – whether she loved him? He found that his eyes were always seeking her and his breathing would quicken when she was near. He'd begun to think her beautiful, irreplaceable but he never acted on the feelings churning inside him. Sakura too often threw him longing stares but she made no move either.

Perhaps they were both waiting for the other to do something.

Perhaps they had no intention of doing anything more at all.

Perhaps the thought of her husband - who they both knew she loved still - and her daughter was what was keeping them distanced.

Whatever the reason, Kakashi decided his feelings were ill advised. Sakura was his student, the only girl on their team, a mother, a wife, a leading village kunoichi – Kakashi couldn't be her hero, he'd never be able whisk her off her feet to find their happy ending. Their roles had already been written – it was too late to change the tale now.

Because after all, weren't they just side characters in someone else's story?

 **Ermmmm does anyone possibly have any interest in being a Beta/adviser for me? Not a lot of work I promise :)**


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